The new Batman movie will have plenty of villains, but most have had previous appearances on the big screen. We've also seen other foes like Deadshot, Kiler Croc and Black Mask showing up in non-Batman films like Suicide Squad and the upcoming Birds of Prey. Even so, there are plenty of Batman foes that are still waiting for their debut. The more fantastical characters like Man-Bat and Clayface are right at the top of my list. Perhaps they could tie into experiments being performed by Professor Hugo Strange, who also has yet to appear on the big screen.
Whoa, interesting cover!
ReplyDeleteI get the impression that Warner Bros. and DC are still trying to figure out a direction for Batman and Superman...
The Doctor Strange sequel should be interesting. I guess The Scarlet Witch will be part of the cast tying in to the Disney+ series...
spoiler alert. Crisis had TV Flash meet Movie Flash and GL and later, Swamp Thing make a cameo.
ReplyDeleteDC had Marv Wolfman help write ch 4. DC can do some things right Hope for future projects.
Marv Wolfman didn't just help write the episode, he was IN it!
ReplyDeleteFunny thing is I never considered Man Bat an enemy, of course I think back to the 70s & early 80s version when he was more in control. Never liked how warped the writers made him
ReplyDeleteYep. He got Flash & Supergirl to autograph a pic of themselves and told them he remembers them working together for a long time. And Star labs looked like it was completely fixed.
ReplyDeleteI'm with Cavillier 1970. I prefer to think of Man-Bat as an ally of Batman because that's what he was when I first encountered him. I never warmed up to thinking of him as an enemy....
ReplyDeleteBeautiful composition. I especially like the way Strange’s hands echo the shape of Man-Bat’s claws. At first glance I thought Strange was by Colan and Man-Bat by Adams. I was surprised to find I was wrong on both counts.
ReplyDeleteWas this cover based on a Marvel one that featured Doctor Strange and 'Werewolf by Night'?
ReplyDeleteI'd like to see Film Freak make his Bat-flick debut. Perhaps doing a homage to the old Universal monster movies. My fvorite story from the BATMAN: TAS spin-off comic was "House of Dorian." Guest-starring Tygrus, Man-Bat, and Tony Romulus as the Werewolf of Gotham City!
ReplyDeleteP.S.---Was Doc trying to locate his missing brother Adam when he came across Langstrom?
ReplyDeleteI think this would be a great story, featuring both of Dr. Strange's skill sets: his magic to bring Man-Bat under control, and his medical expertise to find a cure (sure, his specialty is neurosurgery, but I think he's been shown -- in typical fiction-writer fashion -- to have proficiency in other fields as well). That makes him the best person to help in this matter. He might call upon Batman or Nightwing for a bit of help (or vice versa), but he'd be leading the solution.
ReplyDeleteUnlike Prof. Strange and Clayface, both of whom had roles on Gotham, Man-Bat has yet to have any live-action representation. An episode of Batwoman might be appropriate, but the big screen would have a better budget for some performance capture. Still, the Arrowverse has shown us Gorilla Grodd, King Shark, and Parasite, so Man-Bat might be on the horizon.
I do know Man-Bat's early comics appearance well enough to know that he can be either friend or foe; I remember reading his very first appearance when I was a kid. It took Dr. Langstrom some time to get his Man-Bat side under control. In fact, it's that similarity to the Lizard that led me to suggest the meeting we saw in #2606. I'd love to see a re-visitation some time, with Langstrom trying to help Conners achieve the same control. (In fact, I think there would be many potential stories to tell with those two! Like, Conners achieving control as Langstrom loses it, both of them captured by Prof. Strange or the Collector....)
Joining in the Crisis discussion: That Ezra Miller cameo would have completely floored me, had a certain YouTuber not spoiled it (I think he's an East Coast person who had seen it, but posted it a good half-hour or more before it aired here on the West Coast). But it occurs to me that Ezra would've been definitely up for that, and it wouldn't surprise me at all to learn that he did it for scale.
I did laugh out loud at Marv's cameo, though (and Marv, if you're reading this, you're a not half-bad actor), and I was also thrilled with the appearance of Giant Beebo. I'm still working on whether there's any special significance to the Sargon appearance, though.
(Someday, Ross, you should see if you can't do a cover with Giant Beebo and the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man! Given that Giant Beebo is the combination of seven Legends, and SPMM is the physical embodiment of Gozer, that would be an epic battle!)
And here's a random trivium: Eileen Pedde, who played the President in the finale, also portrayed an unnamed doctor in the 2013 Arrow episode "Vertigo," and also had a role on two early episodes of Smallville ("Insurgence" and "Witness") as a character named Jennifer Small. As far as the former goes, it's not impossible that they're the same individual.
PS @Tobor: I somehow missed that GL cameo. I guess I'll have to rewatch it.
ReplyDeleteI'll bet it wasn't Ryan Reynolds, though. :-(
ReplyDelete@Cary: I did rewatch it; it was from Ryan's GL film, but didn't show any individual faces -- probably because it was intended as a tease for the upcoming show on HBO MAX (just as other scenes in the same montage referenced the live-action shows on DC Universe).
ReplyDeleteIn other words, CW cheated. ;-)
ReplyDeleteSort of, yeah. But in a highbrow way. (I'd more say "fudged.")
ReplyDeleteLOL! My octagenarian dad would say "Sorta cheating is like a woman being sorta pregnant. Gotta be all-or-nothing!"
ReplyDeleteCW showed the camera following as a GL whizzed by and kept going for some distance. They showed a GL to be a flash in the pan.
ReplyDeleteRyan Reynolds as Deadpool
ReplyDelete"...GL whizzed by...BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"